Buddy Timothy suggested we meet up at Yoon's Social Kitchen to try out Teochew kueh by Yoon's Traditional Teochew Kueh. When I got here, I realised that Yoon's Social Kitchen is a social enterprise with a mission to empower women ex-drug offenders "to lead a dignified life free from the bondage of drugs through sustainable employment... ". Besides artisanal traditional Teochew kueh, Yoon's Social Kitchen also serve local delights like mee siam, lontong, Hokkien mee, fried rice, etc.
Yoon's Social Kitchen is the brainchild and baby of Qara Yoon, her mum and business partner Talia Lee. Xara left her job as an administrative manager at Ministry of Education in 2019 to launch Yoon's Traditional Teochew Kueh which is dedicated to teaching the craft and culture of traditional Teochew kueh, especially to the next generation.
Three months ago in Dec 2021, Qara and mum took their enterprise to the next level by launching Yoon's Social Kitchen with Talia.
Yoon's Social Kitchen is a compact, bright, simply furnished but comfortable space.
Yoon's Social Kitchen is a little cafe with a big mission to provide a safe space for women ex-drug offenders to learn a skill to achieve sustainable employment and higher income.
For us customers, Yoon's is a nice place to chill out with friends and family over hand crafted Teochew kueh and local delights. The red ones in front are tiam tor kueh 甜桃餜 and the dark ones behind are cikak kueh 鼠麹粿. The traditional pattern on the kueh are made with wooden moulds.
The skin made with glutinous rice flour and natural colour is relatively thin, soft-chewy and had none of the pesky sticky-gumminess that get stuck in our teeth. The crushed peanut filling is sweetened with brown sugar - it had just the right sweet nuttiness and did not feel sugary at all. Yoon's peanut filling is spiked with candied tangerine 桔饼 which gave it a subtle kum kum sweet-zesty taste and fragrance.
I like it that Yoon's Social Kitchen lay their kueh on banana leafs, lovingly cut to shape the traditional way. The banana leafs impart their signature subtle sweet fragrance to the kueh. The kueh are cooked by steaming which are served at room temperature.
Going clockwise from twelve o'clock, gu chai kueh (chive), mang kuang kueh (Mexican turnip), png kueh (rice), yam kueh.
My favourite type of Teochew kueh is with chive filings because I like the subtly grassy taste and smell of chives. I quickly realised that Yoon's chive kueh is missing the familiar savoury umami flavour because they don't use hae bee or dried shrimp. The kueh are not overly greasy, no, I should say it had very little grease.
Yoon's make their own sambal belacan which tastes savoury umami spicy which work well with their savoury kueh. The sambal belacan adds umami taste to the kueh.
Mang guang kueh with stir fried shredded Mexican turnip, diced mushroom and dried shrimp filling. Yoon's mang guang kueh is their only kueh with dried shrimp. But, it is still clean tasting - sweet slightly savoury with a subtle umami.
Yoon's png kueh is filled with glutinous rice, peanut, seasoned pork belly, and mushroom.
Yoon's yam kueh has yam, mushroom and pork belly (but no dried shrimp).
Besides Teochew kueh, Yoon's has a good range of local delights which make it a good chill out place. We had mee siam.
We also had Hokkien (sotong) mee, lontong, and kai jeow (Thai style omelette over rice). Other items available are braised pork belly over rice, tom yum kung (spicy Thai seafood soup), seafood pao fan / kway teow soup, curry drumstick rice, wok hei fried rice, etc.
Check out Yoon's Social Kitchen and feel the love in their traditional Teochew kueh and local delights.
Written by Tony Boey on 18 Feb 2022
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